Blog Post 2

What more would you like to know about human communication? Based on what we’ve learned, what would be the best approach to answering this question?

I would like to know how daughters can effectively communicate with their fathers? Raising a child to an adult is never easy, but the hardest part is letting them go. This is a lot harder for father than mothers. Though mothers are the nurturers, fathers are the protectors and it’s hard for them to see their “baby girl” grow up. Since the bond between a father, whether present or not, and daughter is very important. I feel that the best way to answer this question is through the social constructivist and pragmatic approach.

The social constructivist approach suggests that we never experience the world directly, but to take significant parts of a culture, recognize them, connect them to other “facts” that we know, and then respond to them. Basically it says to take you have been taught through experiences to help you communicate. The book also says that we must carefully consider whether those roles enhance our identities or inhibit them. We also need to understand the tools of the social constructivist approach. The tools from the social constructivist approach are: symbolic codes, cognitive customs, cultural traditions, and shared roles and rules. These tools are based upon people’s representation of reality.

The pragmatic approach recommends that understand that to every move you make affects the other person and every move they make affect you; like in a game. Also that even if no move is made, it is still apart of the game. The parts of the game in the pragmatic approach are: act, interact, interdependent, and partners. They are based upon a system of interlocking, interdependent behaviors that become patterned over time. From knowing these parts you can then find more productive ways to play the communication game.

By knowing the aspects of both of these approaches, can help fathers and daughters to understand where one another are coming from. That though there are differences between them, there is still that common ethics and morals instilled in them. Also that life experiences teach and shape us all differently. This allows a father and daughter to move past their problems and work towards building a strong relationship.